


Drift

by Salamandriod



Category: Pacific Rim (2013), Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Pacific Rim Fusion, Angst, Assisted Suicide, Canon-Typical Violence, Implied/Referenced Drug Addiction, M/M, Mentions of Cancer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-14
Updated: 2014-11-14
Packaged: 2018-02-25 07:23:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,874
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2613245
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Salamandriod/pseuds/Salamandriod
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You can always find me in the drift</p>
            </blockquote>





	Drift

It wasn’t supposed to happen again. The kaiju were supposed to leave their world alone after the Pan Pacific Defense Corps closed the rift. And they weren’t supposed to come back in the Atlantic, of all places.

 

When Sebastian first saw the news that a kaiju had breached seven years after the rift had been closed, he hadn’t been concerned at all. He was used to chaos, what was a little more? It helped that it had gone for the Americas as its first target. There was a tickling at the back of his mind telling him to do _something_. This wasn’t the same sort of chaos that he liked, after all.

 

Jim laughed at him when he voiced his concerns, hearing a punchline to a joke he never told. “Let some other idiot with a hero complex risk themselves. You’re more valuable here,” he replied once he calmed down. That was the end of the conversation.

 

- 

 

The next three kaiju came and went, the world building jagers just in time to kill them. They knew what to do now, but it took time to build a team good enough to be able to close the breach again.

 

Each time Sebastian would bring his hopes up again, only to have them swiftly dismantled like the kaiju themselves. “I just don’t see why you’re so intent on this,” Jim replied after one particularly nasty argument. Sebastian didn’t have a good answer.

 

It took until a kaiju finally came near enough to their home that all the news could talk about for weeks was how the body was being salvaged. Jim hated that, it took attention away from the crimes that he had worked so long on. But as long as there were kaiju to be killed, no one wanted to hear about murders and arsons.

 

Snuggled in bed in a post-coital haze was when Sebastian asked next, a week after the kaiju had been brought down. “We should try out, just to see if we could. I doubt that the Iceman would actually allow us to fight once he heard, so you don’t have to go risking me for too long,” he murmured, words muffled by Jim’s hair. To his surprise, he wasn’t immediately met with vitriol, but with the soft sound of Jim’s breaths.

 

“You say ‘we’ like we’re going to be drift compatible.”

 

Sebastian gave a gentle squeeze to Jim’s middle. “If I were going to drift with anyone, it’d be you.”

 

-

 

The next day the two are walking into the nearest Pan Atlantic Defense Corps center with Jim demanding that he be taken care of first, as usual. He’s still pessimistic about the whole situation, confident that they aren’t compatible, that their minds and bodies are too different to successfully pilot a jager. He doesn’t bother with forging their papers, either, just waving a flag in front of Mycroft’s face for him to take notice.

 

Training goes as Sebastian expected, working all day and massaging Jim all night so that he could run again in the morning. They made it through together by some miracle, one that Jim wasn’t particularly happy to see. All that was left was to see if they were actually compatible.

 

-

 

In the end, Jim had managed to get the last point, and even Sebastian had looked a little surprised that he had. Compatible, then. Supposing that either could last inside each other’s mind.

 

The next few days passed as a flurry as they were measured again and again for their suits, testing everything to make sure that their jager was up to scratch, and familiarizing themselves with their Command Center team. Try as he might, Jim couldn’t put off the actual test forever.

 

“Come on, Jim,” Sebastian huffed, perfectly alert far too early in the morning for Jim’s tastes. “Today’s the day. Might be the only chance we get in a jager.”

 

Jim groaned and glared at Sebastian, eyes just visible over the edge of his blanket. Sebastian gave him the look, the one where he made him feel just a smidge guilty, and finally he threw his blankets off of himself.

 

“You’re taking me out for dinner if this works.”

 

Sebastian grinned and let Jim have his space to prepare.

 

 

_Explosions. Busy work. Blood, so much blood. Addiction. Men falling around him. A human heart falling to the ground. Hopelessness. Hope. Pub after pub. Power. Jim. A new project. A new life. A live in._

_Love._

_Love?_

_Love._

“Neural Handshake complete.”

 

Jim could hear the whooping of the control team as he came out of the initial shock. He could see- no, he could _feel_ Sebastian grinning, and wasn’t that just the strangest sensation? He felt something at the back of his mind as if Sebastian had looped his arms around him to push the anxiety away. Somehow knowing that Sebastian would always be in the back of his mind was comforting in a way he never expected.

 

-

 

Dinner was fantastic.

 

-

 

They didn’t have much time to strengthen their handshake before they had their first call. Roused in the dead of night by the alarm, both of them were shaking as they went through their routine. They made it out into the sea without a hitch and their first kaiju fell at their hands.

 

A few days after their first fight they received a letter. Judging by the overly ornate stationary, it could only be from Mycroft himself. Instead of the order to stop that they had expected, it was just a simple two words.

 

Good luck.

 

-

 

They became heroes in their own right, though they didn’t get as many kills as other teams. Fortunately for them there were enough jagers in the European area that they could opt out of a mission if they really had to.

 

He should have listened to Jim when he said that he didn’t want to go.

 

_He should have listened._

 

-

 

The mission was like any other, save for Jim’s reluctance to get out of bed. That always happened with the three AM calls now that he had something that resembled an average person’s sleep schedule.

 

“We aren’t going to get any better if you insist on skipping every other mission,” Sebastian scolded, tugging back the blankets to rouse Jim.

 

They just glared at each other for a moment.

 

“I’ll pay for dinner tonight. Anywhere you want to go.”

 

Reluctantly, Jim rolled out of bed.

 

The mission continued on as normal, hopping into their jager and being dropped at sea as close as they could get. The kaiju seemed easy enough as they approached, only looking to be barely the size of a category two.

 

Then it stood up to its full height. Sebastian radioed mission control for backup as Jim stared.

 

Or at least, he tried to stare, but they had to be ready to fight in a moment’s notice. The kaiju was on them immediately, locking them into battle. They just had to hold out until another team could get to them. Surely nothing could go wrong. Surely.

 

Sebastian wasn’t quite sure what had happened, but all he knew was that the left arm- _Jim’s_ arm was locked up and there was a very large kaiju fist aiming straight for the cockpit. Sebastian reached out to block, to grab, to do anything to protect the only thing that mattered in his life, but it was too late.

 

Jim’s memories were a supernova with fear burning at its core. Sebastian had never known Jim to fear anything, but the memories of school, addiction, and murder were burning into his mind every little flicker of fear that the genius ever had. The ones that stung the most were the ones centered on himself and Jim’s fear of his love. They were the ones that burned themselves into his mind before there was suddenly nothing, everything else destroyed by the black hole that Jim had become.

 

Sebastian’s body went on autopilot, just like it had all those years ago in the army. When mission control tried to get a report out of him he could only shrug when asked how he killed the kaiju on his own.

 

It had happened somehow, obviously. When the Portuguese team arrived, the kaiju was already floating limply in the water and a half smashed jager was limping back towards England.

 

As soon as he was close enough to land, Sebastian ripped himself out of his side of the cockpit and tugged Jim from his as delicately as though he were made of paper. The extraction team had to fly them home, one entwined around the other.

 

Even after the flight, they had to wait for Sebastian to pass out before they could extract Jim from his arms.

 

Killed at impact, he would be told later. He wouldn’t have felt a thing. Sebastian knew better.

 

-

 

Sebastian tried to honor Jim’s death by continuing in the service. He was the one that had convinced him to join, he ought to see it out to completion. Besides, he was one of the best pilots they had.

 

If he could recover.

 

He thought he had recovered enough by the time he found another drift partner, but the anxiety he felt the night before their final test should have been enough to tell him otherwise. He went on anyway.

 

-

 

The woman he was partnered with was good, even he had to admit that. She was the sort that he would have tracked down for the empire in a previous life. She gave him a sad smile as they stepped into the cockpit.

 

_War. School. Murder. Friends. Hopelessness. Training. Jim-_

The moment he saw Jim in his own memories he was enraptured again, chasing the rabbit as the criminal held his hand out to him, and offer to get him off the streets.

 

Thankfully the team managed to end the test before anything was damaged.

 

“Sorry, I- I…” he mumbled, scratching his head as they stepped out.

 

“It’s alright, I didn’t expect it to work anyway,” she replied, giving him that same sad smile. She was good, though. She’d find another partner. A better partner.

 

-

 

Perhaps he should have learned after that first test, but he was always the brash one, always willing to try again. There was a point when he stopped trying. It wasn’t the second, when he was caught by the memory of his first promotion. Nor the second, when the slick slide of bodies made that partner leave the cockpit red faced.

 

Maybe the fourth, when he was just defending Jim from an angry client at a meeting. Or the fifth, one of their dinner nights.

 

He stopped counting how many tries he had by the time that his higher ups finally kicked him out. Something about being unable to cope. Sebastian scoffed as he tossed his bag over his shoulder, never looking back.

 

-

 

Sebastian wasn’t sure when they managed to close the breach. He didn’t even know anyone _had_ until he received an invitation to a ceremony to commemorate each of the pilots. Time had been falling in and out of existence for him, never sure just where or when he was. Some of his old mission control teammates visited him from time to time, and all they saw was an addict without his vice.

 

They hoped that perhaps bringing him to the ceremony would help snap him out of his head, but if anything it just made it worse. Stuffed into one of the suits Jim had rarely gotten him to wear and looking about as presentable as he’d ever been, Jim would have liked it.

 

Sebastian found it hard to concentrate on anything going on at the event. He focused just long enough to shake the hands of the women from Ghana who had actually managed to close the breach. The only other thing he remembered about the evening was how the chair to his left was cold and how no amount of flowers piled there would help at all.

 

When he returned back to England there were more events, more parties that he was forced to dress up for. More than once he ran into a certain Holmes brother who rarely gave him more than a calculated look.

 

He approached once, likely for appearances. “Fuck off, Iceman,” Sebastian growled, low enough so that none of the press would hear him.

 

“I just wished to express my condolences. Nothing more,” Mycroft replied as loftily as usual. God, how Sebastian wanted to punch him in the face. Preferably while in a jager.

 

 “Yeah, well, I don’t want them. It’s your fault it’s this way. Could’ve had us arrested in front of the whole shatterdome,” he snapped. His knuckles were turning white as he clenched his glass.

 

Mycroft seemed to regard Sebastian for a moment, then turned as it to leave. “He did more good out there than he would have done in prison. It’s better this way.”

 

The glass shattered in Sebastian’s fist, but before he could pass the pain on to Mycroft he had disappeared into the crowd.

 

He should have listened to Jim. He should have known better.

 

-

 

Years passed. Criminal masterminds rose and fell, none ever even scratching what the empire once was. Sebastian hadn’t changed with the times. He was still living in Conduit Street, though back in his old bed. He didn’t find a new job, not that he needed one with the fortune that was left. He spent just enough on it to keep himself alive, and the rest on booze and cigarettes.

 

Jim always said that one of those would be the death of him. He always laughed and said that he’d more likely die in a hail of bullets while protecting him.

 

He owed Jim a dinner for being right.

 

After a lifetime of drinking and smoking his body had decided to give up. Lung cancer, liver failure, it wasn’t pretty. Fighting kaiju likely hadn’t helped thanks to whatever chemicals and radiation he was exposed to, but it was only now taking its toll.

 

The last thing either of them wanted was to have a drawn out death, especially when it was as ugly as Sebastian’s was going to be. A bullet would be easiest, and the most familiar. There was still poison tucked away in the kitchen cabinets, too. He didn’t want either of those, not when he needed one last fix.

 

The only person that could help him was also the last person he wanted to talk to, but it had to be done. Anthea recognized him when he walked in and led him directly to Mycroft, no questions asked.

 

“I’m dying,” he stated bluntly once the door snapped shut.

 

“So I’ve heard,” Mycroft replied casually, as if they were simply talking about the news. He looked expectantly at Sebastian, expecting some sort of snarky response from the man only to receive silence. “Is that all you wish to tell me?”

 

Sebastian grunted at that and shifted on his feet, trying to overcome his hatred of the man. “I need a favor. I can’t die without one last chance. I’ll try to drift with anyone- any _thing_ if it means…” he trailed off, heart catching in his throat.

 

Mycroft nodded, understanding. “I shall see what I can do.”

 

That was all Sebastian needed before he turned and left to take care of his last arrangements.

 

-

 

It took a bit of time to get everything set up at the hospital. Pons headsets weren’t exactly typical medical fare, and nor was the machine that was supposed to simulate another person to drift with. The staff managed to get everything in its place, including the syringe that would bring the end of Sebastian’s life.

 

He grunted a thanks to Mycroft as he was being prepared, not wanting his last words to be to his mortal enemy even if he had set this up for him. Thankfully Mycroft didn’t stick around long, seemingly having no desire in his enemy’s end either.

 

Finally, it was his time. He gave a nod to the nurse in charge of overseeing his end and ignored the small crowd of doctors and nurses that had gathered to witness the drift. It wasn’t something seen often, and he didn’t blame them for being curious.

 

_Bloody deserts. Numbers. Bombs exploding. A Wikipedia article on Afghanistan. Hopelessness. An article about homeless veterans. Jim. Crime rates in Great Britain. Jim, his sun and stars-_

 

_Jim_

Jim, holding his hand out to him just like he had when he pulled him off of the streets. There was something not quite right with this memory, making it almost dream like. It was still Jim holding his hand out with that promise of the whole world at their feet, but the maniacal glint was missing from his eyes. Replacing it was something softer, like the Jim he saw in those lazy mornings after particularly long jobs. He was too caught up the other’s eyes to realize that they were standing in a jager cockpit instead of a dirty alleyway.

 

The doctors and nurses saw the first smile on Sebastian’s face in years, and the last that would ever grace it.

 

Sebastian felt Jim’s hand in his, and he was whole again. 

**Author's Note:**

> Please forgive the lack of editing on this. I had the idea in the middle of the night and had to get it out of my head. I hope you enjoyed.


End file.
